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Israeli ministers today, Friday, rejected the International Court of Justice’s order for Israel to cease its military operation in the southern Gaza city of Rafah, vowing to continue the fight to free detainees and defeat the Islamic Resistance Movement (Hamas).

The international court’s ruling on Friday is the latest in a series of steps taken in recent weeks that have exacerbated Israel’s international isolation due to its conduct during the war in Gaza, which led to the martyrdom of nearly 36,000 Palestinians, according to local health authorities.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office dismissed the accusations in the case brought by South Africa that Israel is committing genocide in Gaza, describing them as “false, disgraceful, and morally repugnant.”

The office’s statement said, “Israel acts based on its right to defend its territory and citizens, in accordance with its ethical values and compliance with international law.”

The statement added that operations in Rafah would not be conducted in a manner “that may affect the living conditions of the Palestinian civilian population in Gaza in a way that could lead to their total or partial physical destruction.”

The war that erupted on October 7th of last year on Israeli towns has widened the gap between Israel and most of the world and led to severe tension between Netanyahu’s government and its closest allies, including the United States.

Rafah, near the border with Egypt, received more than a million Palestinians displaced from their homes due to the Israeli ground assault and aerial bombardment until the army issued an evacuation order earlier this month, prompting hundreds of thousands to seek refuge in camps in central Gaza.

Outside Israel, there is shock at the harrowing images broadcast on television of suffering amid the rubble and debris in Gaza, where relief agencies struggling to secure enough emergency supplies warn of an escalating humanitarian crisis.

The Fighting Continues

However, the practical and immediate impact of the International Court of Justice’s order on Israeli policy will likely be limited, aside from reinforcing the defiant mood domestically already fueled by the International Criminal Court’s Prosecutor’s request for arrest warrants against Netanyahu and Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant.

Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir, who heads a hardline nationalist religious party playing a key role in stabilizing Netanyahu’s ruling coalition, also rejected the ruling.

Ben-Gvir quoted a famous phrase by David Ben-Gurion, Israel’s first Prime Minister, on social media platform X, saying, “Our future does not depend on what the non-Jews (Goyim) say but on what the Jews do.”

The case brought by South Africa to the International Court of Justice was based on Israel’s involvement in genocide through the killing of Palestinians in Gaza and causing them severe psychological and physical harm and creating living conditions “calculated to destroy them.”

Israel describes these accusations as disgraceful and says it does everything in its power to protect civilians, accusing Hamas of deliberately using civilians as human shields, which the movement that has controlled Gaza since 2007 denies.

Whether coincidental or not, shortly after the ruling was read in The Hague, residents of Rafah spoke of very intense aerial bombardment on the city where the Israeli occupation army conducts reconnaissance attacks on its outskirts.

Israeli occupation forces have been massing on the outskirts of the city for weeks before a long-announced operation to destroy what the army says are four remaining Hamas battalions lurking there.

Fierce fighting also continued in other areas of Gaza, especially in the Jabalia area in the north, where the army earlier said it had retrieved the bodies of three detainees killed in the “Al-Aqsa Flood.”

Benny Gantz, the minister in Israel’s war government who spoke with U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken, said Israel “is committed to continuing the fight to return its hostages and ensure the security of its citizens, wherever and whenever necessary, including in Rafah.”

Reuters